Tutorial · Text & layers

Text, layers and safe zones: titles that survive platform UI

How to put text on the canvas, position it deliberately, stack it with b-roll, and keep it clear of the TikTok/Reels/Shorts interface chrome — captured on the production build.

Three ways to get text on T1

The header Text button adds an editable text clip at the playhead. Right-clicking the timeline or the canvas offers Add Text at Playhead. And Whisper captions arrive as their own T1 clips when you transcribe. All three are ordinary clips: move, trim, split, delete — exactly like video.

Positioning text on purpose

Drag text directly on the canvas, or set Position X/Y numerically in the properties panel. Font, size, color and alignment live there too. Drag snaps to nothing and needs no modifier keys — the canvas is the fastest path, the panel is the precise one.

Layering: who wins an overlap

Visual clips stack by z-order: V1 base, V2 overlay, T1 text on top by default. Right-click any visual clip for Send to Front / Send to Back when a sticker should sit over a caption or a cutaway belongs under a title. The layering you set in the preview is what the exporter draws.

Safe zones: design for the overlay

Enable Safe Zones and pick TikTok, Reels or Shorts — the preview simulates each platform's UI chrome and flags caption collisions in amber. Auto-Fix moves captions into the measured clear band, and the same logic runs before export so the flagged state is the state you ship.

First-hand captures

Recorded from the production build of this site: a real browser session driving the real editor, with no cuts or retakes. Output files below were produced by the editor's own export engine.

Real session: text clip creation, all four style previews, and the assets/manifest flow — the same surfaces this tutorial walks through.

Supported formats

Text clips: T1 track, per-clip font (Inter/Arial/Impact/monospace), size 12–72, color, alignment
Canvas position: drag or numeric X/Y as a fraction of frame size; layering via z-order
Safe-zone presets: TikTok, Instagram Reels, YouTube Shorts overlays at 9:16

Known limitations

Collision detection covers the caption band and known UI bars — it is measured guidance, not a platform guarantee
Per-character animation (typewriter, karaoke wipe inside a word) is a live-preview effect and is approximated in exports
Font choices are the bundled set until custom font upload ships
Text is not yet draggable while playing — pause first

Start from the beginning with your first vertical edit, or read how captions are generated in the local captions guide.